~M~

I am not aware these persons spoken of are 'historians'. are you sure about that?

Toto

punkforchrist wrote: Apologists Gary Habermas and William Lane Craig continually quote the statistic that 75% of New Testament scholars believe that the tomb was empty.

It doesn't matter for my argument whether these people are labeled scholars or historians.

stuart shepherd

Dear Stable Flux,
That is a good point about the woman not telling anyone. If they didn't tell anyone, how would anyone have known and reported what happened? Excellent point.

I like your comparison with Orson Welles and war of the worlds and the gospels. All great fiction.

Stuart Shepherd

stuart shepherd

In PFC's opening remarks he refers to ....""the historical core of evidence in favor of Jesus’ bodily resurrection.""

Evidently PFC mistakenly believes that the Bible reports that Jesus resurrected "bodily" and not spiritually. In more than one prior post it was shown how Paul believed that Jesus rose from the dead spiritually and not bodily. But I believe that the writer of the Gospel according to Matthew, also shared that view.

Follow along...........
Matthew 28:1 (King James Version)
1In the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene and the other Mary to see the sepulchre.

The Marys come to the tomb.

2And, behold, there was a great earthquake: for the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it.

There is a great earthquake and an angel rolls the stone from the mouth of the tomb. But there is no mention of Jesus walking out and saying "Here I am"
Presumably Jesus had already left the tomb while the tomb was closed and the stone was in place. Only a spirit could have left the sealed tomb.

In verse 6, the angel tells the Marys that Jesus is not here, confirming that Jesus left the sealed tomb. Something he could have only accomplished if he were a spirit and not bodily.

I feel stupid writing about this because the only way any of this makes sense is if it is fiction. A fable. A supernatural tale that makes no sense in the natural world. Of course it is fiction.

In any event, the text shows that the writer of Matthew's Gospel did not believe in a bodily resurrection. So much for PFC's ""historical core of evidence in favor of Jesus’ bodily resurrection.""

The contradiction between those Bible writers who believe Jesus rose bodily and those Bible writers who believe Jesus rose spiritually, just demonstrates that if they can't agree on this important detail the whole story is fiction.
Remember, God himself is supposed to have inspired the writing of this story.

Stuart Shepherd

~M~

that was not sean's argument. sean did not mention historians.

Toto

How does this relate to the original question, which I though had to do with an argument by Stuart Shepherd as to why Christians believe?

stuart shepherd

THE EMPTY TOMB

Lets look at this logically. If tomorrow you read in a newspaper that a body was missing, would you assume that the corpse had been resurrected? I doubt that you would. So just because Jesus' body was missing, if there is even any truth to this story, why should we believe that he resurrected?

I would think that if the day after Jesus' supposed resurrection, the gospels would have been written and distributed, then perhaps someone with relevant information might have come forward to challenge the claim of the Apostles.

BUT...and this is a very big BUT....
What if the body were removed by unknown persons who had no desire to make known their actions in removing the body?
Perhaps no civic minded citizens had any knowledge of who removed Jesus' corpse.
Or perhaps no one besides Jesus' followers knew that anyone was even claiming that Jesus had resurrected. After all, the gospels were written many years after the events that they supposedly report.
Look at this...
Matthew 28:15(King James Version)
So they took the money, and did as they were taught: and this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day.
This Scripture proves that Matthew wrote his gospel many years later.

Stuart Shepherd

stuart shepherd

And The Graves Opened Up and The Saints came Tumbling Out.


There are several verses in Matthew's Gospel that do not appear in any of the other New Testament writings.
Whenever I read these verses, my imagination wanders, and I think about what this might have been like if it were really true.
Matthew 27:50-53(King James Version)
50Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost.

51And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent;

52And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose,

53And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.

Just imagine for a moment what Matthew is describing.....
Jesus cries out with a loud voice and dies.
Causing an earth quake which opens the graves of the saints, and they arise from the sleep of death.
But even though the saints are now miraculously alive, they hang around in their open graves from Friday afternoon until Sunday morning when they come out of the graves after the resurrection, and go into the city of Jerusalem.

Isn't this a strange and unbelievable tale.
I wonder who these saints were? How long had they been dead? How many saints are we talking about? Matthew did say "many". Would "many" be more than 50% of all the saints that ever lived , died, and were buried at Jerusalem? This could be a very large number of "saints" since Jerusalem had been a city of the Jews for almost 1000 years. How were these "many" chosen from "all" the saints who lived and died at Jerusalem? Were there a few prophets, like Isaiah, Jeremiah, Zechariah, Malachi etc in this group of "many" who arose from the dead?

While these saints who had just arose from the dead were laying around their graves from Friday afternoon until after the resurrection Sunday morning, did they get hungry or thirsty? I can't imagine there isn't much to eat or drink at a graveyard. What about toilet facilities? Toilet paper? Any shade from the sun in a graveyard? Or did they work on their tans....get a little color....I imagine that they must have been a little pale from being dead.

What about clothes. If they were buried like Jesus wrapped in a linen shroud they wouldn't have anything stylish to wear when they paraded through the gates of Jerusalem. I wonder if the linen shrouds hadn't rotted and they would of had to have presented themselves to the folks in Jerusalem "au naturale," "in the buff", naked. In my imagination the scene of the risen saints entering Jerusalem must have been similar to the movie "Dawn of the Dead" where the dead come out of their graves and swarm into the city. I imagine such a scene would scare the hell out of most people.

But what happened when the risen saints got back to their former homes? Were their families gone? Was someone else living in their house? Was their spouse now married to someone else. Was everything from their former life now gone? How could their family, work, wealth, possessions, there former life, be restored?

If this really happened it would have been the biggest news event in the history of the world. But unbelievably, Matthew is the only one to mention it. Not a word from anyone else. I would have expected that at least one of the risen saints would have written about his miraculous recovery from being dead. What about the Roman authorities? Surely someone would have notified Rome. What if a former prophet was among the risen saints, might he have written another book of prophecy? But Nothing else was wtitten that we know of.

So what happened to these saints? Did they die again at some future time?

Hebrews 9:27(King James Version)
And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:

But if the saints died again, they would have died twice. But ""it is appointed unto men once to die"". Wouldn't this be a contradiction?

Is it possible to really believe that this fabulous tale is true?

This tall tale just exposes the Gospels for what they really are....FICTION.

Stuart Shepherd

~M~

because the original question was why it was mentioned at all in Sean's statement, not Stuart's post.

stuart shepherd

Dear ~M~,

PFC wrote.......
I believe that the purpose of Sean's paragraph that you seem to think is irrelevant to the debate, is to demonstrate that Christian belief in the resurrection is not rational but is based on ""fear, desirability, repetition, indoctrination and conditioning, which generally come from family, church, friends, community and country.""
Sean's argument is specifically crafted, in my opinion, to counter what PFC wrote in the box above concerning ""rationally compelling evidence to believe in the Resurrection."" In light of what PFC wrote, I believe that Sean's comments are relevant to the debate.

Stuart Shepherd